Guccifer 2.0 the hacker rose from the obscurity of the dark side of the web to internet fame this year when he hacked the DNC’s email system, leading to the downfall of Debbie Wasserman-Schultz and all sorts of mayhem. There have been promises of more to come, largely through the assistance of Wikileaks, but the hacker himself has become something of a media celebrity. For some strange reason however, Twitter decided today that they would suspend his account. (Daily Caller)
Twitter has suspended the account of the computer hacker who on Friday published a spreadsheet purported to contain personal contact information for nearly 200 Democratic members of Congress.
The hacker, who goes by the pseudonym Guccifer 2.0 and is believed to be somehow connected to the Russian government, had recently invited reporters to reach out through Twitter to obtain additional hacked documents.
WikiLeaks, which last month published nearly 20,000 Democratic National Committee emails stolen by hackers, flagged the suspension of the Guccifer 2.0 account.
Guccifer 2.0 published some DNC information on a WordPress website starting in June. The hacker shared other documents with several news outlets. WikiLeaks published the 20,000 DNC emails last month.
Apparently it wasn’t just his Twitter account which was under scrutiny. When I checked in on his WordPress blog today there was an unusual entry in the most recent slot.
Since he was in the process of setting up interviews with media outlets regarding his latest batch of information, one has to wonder why Twitter chose this particular moment. More than a few readers were sending in thoughts to our tip line about this and one question stuck out as soon as I saw it: Would they have suspended the account if he had only hacked the Republicans? Food for thought, anyway.
As far as WordPress goes, they at least have a published policy to fall back on. They don’t need to complain about partisan politics or accusations of hacking. They have a standing rule that they will not allow the unauthorized publication of private information, and Guccifer has cheerfully admitted to grabbing and releasing the cell phone numbers and contact information for hundreds of Democrats via the DNCC.
Really not much more to add to this one. This obviously won’t slow down the ability of the press to exchange information with the hacker since he’s already established lines of communications. It will just take a little longer for everyone else to catch up.
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